Embodiments relate to three-dimensional (3D) image photographing apparatuses and methods, and more particularly, to a 3D image photographing apparatus for embodying a 3D image without distortion from image lights incident at different angles by using a single image sensor, and a 3D image photographing method thereof.
Recently, various visual media using three-dimensional (3D) images have become more popular, including 3D movies, 3D television, and 3D games. 3D images are characterized by a 3D effect that allows a viewer to feel that he/she is seeing a 3D object. In the past, such 3D images were used in limited fields such as health care. However, recently, 3D images have now influenced everyday people and thus users desire more and more to photograph 3D images. In order to display a 3D image, images that are simultaneously captured at different angles need to be shown to both eyes of a viewer. Thus, an apparatus for capturing a 3D image needs to simultaneously obtain images which a viewer sees at different angles.
Generally, a complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor and a charge-coupled device (CCD) are used as an image sensor for converting an image light into an electrical signal. In particular, the CMOS image sensor uses an electronic shutter, such as a rolling shutter, instead of a mechanical shutter, to be small in size, increase an operation speed, and decrease cost.
The rolling shutter sequentially operates to read data of each pixel of an image sensor line-by-line. However, a captured image may be distorted since points of time when exposures of the pixel lines end are different.
In particular, when capturing a 3D image, image signals obtained from image lights which are incident at different angles overlap with each other, and thus, a left image and a right image are not completely separated. Due to this, a 3D image, which is embodied from the left and right images, may be distorted.